Goodreads Librarians Group discussion
Same name, different authors
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Wayne
(last edited Aug 25, 2016 12:09PM)
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Aug 24, 2007 03:11PM
I share the same name with two other authors. Is there a way I can edit the list of books I've written to take out those by my namesakes?
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From Goodreads help:One of our biggest unsolved challenges is to figure out how to separate authors with the same names. It would be great if all authors had a unique number like an ISBN! In the meantime, unraveling these messes is a manual process. The way to do it is give each author a unique name. A middle name or initial is best, but failing that we found a good trick: add an extra space in between the authors first and last names (it won't be displayed). You'll need to do this while editing one of the authors books, because if you edit the authors data directly you just change the author name for all his books. You'll also need librarian status.
So, add an extra space in the author's name for all your books (or vice-versa ;) ), and you should be set.
IMDb.com assigns a Roman numeral in parentheses (II) following duplicate names.I believe that the first one entered receives the (I) after entry of the second (II). Numbering could instead occur in historical order so that the older, first published author receives the (I) ordination and subsequently published authors of the same name receive the (II), (III), and so forth.
What about birthdate? The Library of Congress information includes the author's dates of birth and death (if applicable). If GoodReads could add a field for this, it would be an easy and (I think) elegant solution . . .
The author profile at Goodreads has fields for the author's dates of birth and death. I don't believe that the author's info is keyed or indexed off of that though. It seems to only be keyed on the name.
Mod
Otis
I'm trying to clean up the list of books that comes up for author James Buchanan. Included in the list is this book http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/63.... It doesn't appear that there is any way to edit the additional author names. Should I delete James Buchanan and then add him back in with two extra spaces between his first and last name?
Yes, that's the way to disambiguate secondary authors.(It was kind of surprising to see such an old topic get bumped! I take this means that the group search is still only turning up very old threads? There should have been many more recent conversations about this which you could have bumped if you didn't want to start a new thread (which would have been okay too).)
Cait wrote: "Yes, that's the way to disambiguate secondary authors.(It was kind of surprising to see such an old topic get bumped! I take this means that the group search is still only turning up very old th..."
Sorry Cait. I just started reading the first thread that came closest to what I was searching for. I just joined this group and it's a tad overwhelming :)
No problem -- better to ask questions in some fashion than not at all!
Greetings, I'm wondering if someone might be able to change the editors name of this book:http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/85...
from 'Ben Evans' to 'Benjamin Evans.' There's a name conflict with the following author:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49...
Thanks and Cheers
Normally we stick to the form that appears in or on the book, if possible. However, I'm having trouble determining what that is. (I see that it's "Benjamin Evans" on the web site, but if it's "Ben Evans" in the book we can keep that and separate the two.)
On the credits page in the book, he is listed as 'Benjamin Evans.' When I created the book, I listed him as 'Ben Evans,' not thinking there would be a conflict. Either one works, I guess, if you can separate the two or just change his name. Thanks again.
Now changed to Benjamin Evans. I'm surprised that there's only one other, but the one you inquired about can be found at http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/...
I'm guessing the Rosemary Gibson who wrote The Treatment Trap is a different one than the romance author. ;)
Rosemary Gibson is dealt with & added to Please Disambig. thread. A couple of the books were Rosemary M. Gibson who writes Scottish history stuff.
